The 100 Greatest Music Videos Of All Time

Sometime around 2004 I downloaded a file called "100 greatest music videos of all time". It was an endeavor that probably lasted several days, and I was extremely pleased that the content turned out to be just what it said on the tin.

This one specific torrent file introduced me to a lot of great artists I hadn't known about, and many cool videos (most of them, it seemed, directed by either Spike Jonze or Michel Gondry). I had the videos saved on my computer for a long time, and I would watch my favourites often and show them to others.

This was, of course,  many years and computers ago, and the videos are long gone.

Once every few years a wave of nostalgia hits me and I try to look up some of these videos, the ones I can still remember. The one up top is R.E.M.'s Imitation Of Life. It's a creatively made video, consisting of a short clip of footage of a big, lively scene, the video playing forwards and backwards and zooming in on different parts of the view, following different characters. The video is on YouTube but the quality is pretty bad - sure, it doesn't help that the original video is also mostly (digitally?) zoomed in, but it had to have been better than this! 19 million views on this pixelated mess.

I try to google this list. Torrent sites have come and gone but maybe somewhere it's still up, if I just find the right magic words? I'm not sure what I want, anyway. Just to have the complete list? Just to know where it's from? To remember something, and know I remember it? I'm too lawful lazy to torrent anything, anyway.
  
It wasn't quite the same list as this one, but probably influenced by it. I couldn't find any music video lists by Rolling Stone or NME from around that time.

Maybe someone in this thread made a list of their own, an improved version? Although it's just a coincidence that this site is still up, of all the forums of that time. Of course they're suggesting the same videos. I keep looking in vain for this specific list or a memory of a file from 2004 for a while, and then I give up again, to try again in a few years.

I often find myself on useless google quests like this, looking online to find something in my head, like a feeling or a memory of a past self. It's hard to consume information or create it, because it's hard to let go of anything. It might be useful one day, it might have some value.

Anyway, here's what I remember of it.

(the 20 songs that I probably most liked in 2004 because I still remember these from the list of)  
100 Greatest Music Videos of All Time
(compiled by anonymous online person)

The White Stripes - Seven Nation Army
The White Stripes - Fell In Love With A Girl
The White Stripes - The Hardest Button To Button
R.E.M. - Imitation Of Life
Daft Punk - Around The World
Cibo Matto - Sugar Water
Björk - All Is Full Of Love
George Harrison - When We Was Fab
Soundgarden - Black Hole Sun
Korn - Freak On A Leash
Fiona Apple - Across the Universe
The Chemical Brothers - Let Forever Be
Fatboy Slim - Weapon of Choice
Fatboy Slim - Praise You
Gorillaz - Clint Eastwood
Gorillaz - 19-2000
Weezer - Buddy Holly
Bob Dylan - Subterranean Homesick Blues
A-Ha - Take On Me
Röyksopp - Remind Me
The Cardigans - My Favorite Game
Massive Attack - Butterfly Caught

Some Thoughts on ASMR

I’m sure a lot has been written about ASMR, but there doesn’t yet seem to be a consensus on what it is, precisely. The name, for one, is just pure nonsense - “Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response”. I highly recommend this NYT article about ASMR from April 2019 that goes more into detail about the history and present of these videos, and gives us this lovely quote:

”The YouTube subculture is bonded not by belief but rather by an ineffable sensation — perhaps the first time the internet has revealed the existence of a new feeling.”

Many ASMR videos have millions and millions of views. I’m sure a lot of people play them while they sleep, so not everyone actually watches while the video plays. ASMR videos don’t make me sleepy, but I use them as sort of colourful, unpredictable background noise when trying to get something visual done, music feels too distracting and I can’t quite focus on listening to a podcast. I usually put on something ”slurpy” like this one:  

 

There’s different subgenres of videos. Some common ones are mouth-sound and whispering videos, roleplays, videos of just tapping and crinkling different objects (videos where only the person’s hands are in view) and videos of some kind of relaxing treatment done to someone else. The roleplays are usually videos of a situation where another person pays intense attention to you, the viewer. Different sort of nurse’s examinations and spa treatments and such are common.

It’s not that long ago though that there was a stigma about the whole thing. It was considered supremely cringy and embarrassing, and people would enjoy the videos in secret. In recent years the genre has achieved more of a mainstream status. There’s ASMR ads and celebrity interviews. Many people, like Gibi, actually make their living on YouTube by producing a steady stream of content. Apparently there's some Finnish 'ASMRtists' too but that just sounds way too distracting for me to listen to.

I think there’s a few different things to be taken from ASMR videos. Many ASMR videos tap on to some kind of primal need to be noticed and taken care of. I don’t know if it’s a sad state of affairs that people are now going to online videos to get the grooming we used to provide for each other, or if it’s a good thing that such needs are noticed to be important and taken care of in some way. Emotional labor of young women gets finally paid for - in ad revenue. Yay, another win for capitalism?

It’s still weird, somewhat cringy and embarrassing. I guess that’s a part of what makes the whole thing interesting to me. What is too intimate, what is too personal? A person wouldn’t blog about their porn viewing habits out of a sense of common decency, but there’s a lot about it that’s pretty similar… like the part about trying to put into words what sort of weird shit you want the Internet to show you next, then skipping through the video to see what sort of triggers it has to see if something works for you.

Is any need to physically feel good just as shameful as the need to get off? Should watching weird tingly videos of people tapping on different surfaces be left as a personal sort of guilty pleasure, only to be viewed and appreciated in private? Should we redefine the words ’social porn’? Is this degeneracy and unabashed hedonism a sign of the end times and approaching apocalypse? Is the Internet making everyone sad and lonely and unable to find comfort, love and meaningful relationships with real, physical, imperfect people? Is this the part where this blog post turns into yet another rant about how social media is ruining everything despite it having little to do with the subject matter?

 Shrug emoji.



Some random extrathoughts to maybe expand on later:

- how the word ’porn’ has taken on the meaning of ’high quality images’ at reddit, where weird little subreddits such as r/skyporn, r/ruralporn or even r/animalporn and r/humanporn contain high quality images (and absolutely no sex of any kind)

- parasocial relationships to creators

- now that ironic detachment has fallen out of style, what does ’guilty pleasure’ even mean anyway?

Some Thoughts on Comic Zines

Spread from J.Oldén's zine Memes (2019)

From Wikipedia: 

A zine (/ziːn/ ZEEN; short for magazine or fanzine) is a small-circulation self-published work of original or appropriated texts and images, usually reproduced via photocopier. Zines are the product of either a single person or of a very small group, and are popularly photocopied into physical prints for circulation.

 

Last weekend, 7. - 8.9., I attended Helsinki Zine Fest that was held as a part of Helsinki Comics Festival at Suvilahti. I had a table with a few friends, and we all had some zines for sale. I met a bunch of lovely people, old aqcuintances and new, and had a lot of fun. I also acquired a bunch of new comics. I also witnessed a magical moment when a friend got approached to be published because her zine was seen by the right person - definitely a highlight.

I love comic zines. Even the shitty ones – sometimes, especially the shitty ones. I love zines as a form of publishing and I love comics. There’s just something amazing about one person making something completely on their own – to make a comic, you really only need a pencil and a piece of paper. You don’t even have to know how to draw or write very well, you just have to have something you want to say. 

Some people, if they can afford it, print their zines at an actual printing house. The cheaper way is to make photocopies by yourself at the local library - or better yet, at school, if you happen to attend one. Nowadays though because so many people have access to all sorts of graphic design software and color printers it's really easy to make something professional looking by yourself, and the black-and-white photocopied DIY leaflet is more and more of an aesthetic choice than a necessity. 

Anyway, even if you get your printing done for next to nothing, pretty much no one is going to pay their bills just by selling zines. It’s a labour of love.

 

Page from Esko Heikkilä's zine Missä sinä olet - sivuja luonnoslehtiöistä 2014 & 2015

Not that “actual, published” comic artists in Finland are usually swimming in money, either, mind you. Many people get published and still make and sell their own little zines. It's a lovely culture, and zines can be a good way for "trying out" new material, or making more unpolished content.

Part of the culture of making and buying zines is also exchanging them. Every festival I go with my backpack full of my zines, and I leave with a bunch of different ones - there's often not a lot of money involved. Almost everyone who makes zines likes to read them, too. Common themes are LGBT, anti-capitalist and mental health issues, and personal diary comics. Sketch book zines are also a staple, as are zines that are basically just a collection of illustrations (like Inktober collections).

I see a bright future for the comic zine culture in Finland. It’s true that in these days of "konmari" and all the talk of uncluttering your life, fewer and fewer people want to buy physical media of any sort. I still think that as with music and vinyls, the people who care will keep it alive. As Internet and social media platforms keep getting scarier and scarier, it’s good to hold on to some alternative forms of circulating content.

Page from my zine Sarjispäivis - päiväkirjasarjiksia ja sketsejä maaliskuu - syyskuu 2019